Len Goodman, who has died of cancer aged 78, had just turned 60 when he found television fame as head judge on Strictly Come Dancing after a professional ballroom career in which he won the British Exhibition Championships and taught at his own school.
“When I was first asked to do the programme, I wasn’t sure, because I thought it might be a bit of a mickey-take,” he told the Guardian in 2006. “But I’m so glad I did it because it’s dispelled the preconception about what dance classes or schools are like. The programme has changed things in dancing schools like you can’t imagine. Everyone has had huge influxes of people coming to dance. It’s absolutely brilliant.”
